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<title>The Resource Scheduler</title>
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<h2>Overview</h2>
<p>
The Resource Scheduler is a Java Swing Component which is intended to 
help in the creation of an application for tracking resource usage.
What is a resource?  Anything you want to track usage for.  But really, 
a resource can be anything.
</p><p>
For example, if you are trying to write an application to schedule
doctors at a doctors office you could use this component to help you. 
Each doctor would be a resource and patients would be the appointments.
It would be harder to use a classic calendar for something like this 
as a calendar is really intended to schedule just one person at a time.
On some days at a doctors office there would likely be more than one 
doctor available and it would be useful to see the two schedules 
side by side.
</p><p>
Other usages might be to schedule time for shared cars at the workplace.
(I'm grasping a bit here).  You've got 3 shared cars and 10 people who 
want to use them.  The cars are resources and each person using the car
is an appointment with the car.
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<h2>What is not included</h2>
<p>
This is not intended to be an off-the-shelf resource scheduler.  Meaning
there is no database behind this component.  Rather there is an abstract
Scheduling model which can be extended and backed with what ever type of 
database you want to use.  An example is included, but that stores its 
data in memory and is reset every time you re-launch the example.
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<h2>Dependencies</h2>
<p>
There is currently a dependency on the JGoodies for the form layout 
manager and Joda time library.  The JGoodies form layout is exceedingly
easy to use and works well with JFormDesigner.  I find Java's native
date and time library to be unnecessarily complicated to use.  Joda is
not only easy to use, free for use, but it can also easily convert to
and from Java's native date/time library.
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<h2>Roadmap</h2>
<p>
Version 1.0 is intended to be functional but lacking in the fancy 
features that would really make this suitable for production software.
Version 1.5 is going to add printing and version 2.0 will add drag and
drop for rearranging appointments, drag for resizing appointments, and
a week and month view.  At this point in time there is no ETA for when 
version 1.5 or 2.0 will be finished, but some paypal donations would 
help to firm up those dates if those type of features were important to 
you.
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<h2>License</h2>
<p>
This component is licensed under the Apache 2.0 license and is free
for use in personal or commercial projects.  You are free to modify it
as you see fit and you are not required to give your modifications back
to me.  I would appreciate it if you would drop me a line if you are 
using this component and have found it useful (or not) and I would 
appreciate any and all feedback.  If I think people are using it, I'll
probably spend more time fixing it up.
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<a href="./tutorial.html">Jump to the tutorial</a>

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